The relative clause in Catalan: functions, typology and variation, diachronic dynamics
- Claus D. Pusch (Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg)
- claus.pusch@romanistik.uni-freiburg.de
- Idioma del curs: anglès
Justificació del curs
This course will be devoted to complex sentences in Catalan involving ‘real’ relative clauses and other instances of syntactic subordination of the relativization type. Relative clauses are of particular interest in linguistics because they represent, alongside with complement and adverbial clauses, a prototypical pattern of clause-linking which in many languages – including the Romance tongues – is widespread not only in written but also spoken language and for which a specific inventory of morpho-syntactic constructions with dedicated morphological elements – the so-called ‘relative pronouns’ – is available. The relativization strategies found in Catalan will be studied in a pan-Romance perspective in order to (1) elucidate the functions of relative-clause formation, (2) get an idea of its evolution on the way from Latin to Modern Catalan and (3) assess the formal morpho-syntactic variation to which the dedicated relativization morphology is subject to in Contemporary Catalan, namely in oral usage.
Breu descripció del curs
In a first step, the theoretical foundations for the study of relative clauses will be laid out, with specific reference to Lehmann’s (1984; 1995) work on relativization. According to Lehmann, who describes relative-clause formation as syntactic nominalization of the attributive type, the relative pronoun is pivotal in this subordination pattern since it accumulates three functions: (1) marking of subordination; (2) marking of the anaphorical reference that holds between the relative clause and the nominal head in the matrix clause; and (3) marking of the syntactic – and hence semantic – function that the head nouns assumes within the relative clause. In a second step, the diachronic dimension of relative-clause formation will be explored in order to get a better impression of: (1) which types of relative-clause construction found in Latin have ‘survived’ in Romance languages and, more specifically, in Catalan; and (2) which morphemes introducing relative clauses in Modern Catalan have been directly inherited from Latin and to which degree the paradigm of relative subordinators has been restructured and complemented in the course of diachrony. A third step in the course will focus on the dynamics of relative-clause formation in oral usage. We will take Gadet’s (1995; 2003) approach to relativization in spoken French as a starting point in order to see (1) if, and to which degree, these ‘advanced’ structural types of relative clauses are attested in contemporary spoken Catalan, as well, and (2) how the structural features of these typically oral relative clauses can be linked to the descriptive model of Lehmann and to the three functions ascribed to the relative pronoun. The latter issue inevitably leads to a critical discussion of the appropriateness of the term ‘relative pronoun’. In the last step, we will turn away from the prototypical adnominal relative-clause referring to a lexical head and we will take an outlook on the structural features of less prototypical instances of relativization-linked construction such as headless relative clauses and cleft sentences.
Esborrany del programa
Session 1: Prototypical relative clauses: theory, typology, diachronic overview
Type: Plenary session (1 hour)
Content: 1. Introduction of the topic and of Lehmann’s model; 2. Typological classification of relative-clause constructions and of the morpho-syntactic elements that are used within these construction; introduction of the notion ‘relative pronoun’; 3. Overview of relativization in Latin and of the historical evolution of the relative-clause construction and subordinating morphemes through the history of Catalan (and Romance in general); 4. Discussion of the diverging status of syntactic subordination in written vs. spoken language and the consequences of this diamesic dimension for relative-clause usage.
Session 2: ‘Advanced’ and less prototypical relative clauses
Type: Plenary session (1 hour)
Content: 1. Introduction of Gadet’s typology of orality-prone relative clauses and discussion of its applicability to Catalan; 2. Which bearings do the structural features of typically oral relative clauses have on the formal and functional description of relativization based on prototypical instances and written language? 3. Description of relative clauses without a matrix clause and a lexical head noun, their syntactic function and their morphological specificities in Catalan; 4. Presentation of cleft sentences as bi-clausal ‘complex’ renderings with ‘simple’ propositional content and their uses as information-structuring device; critical discussion of the relativizing character of the ‘subordinate’ segment of such cleft sentences.
Session 3: Types of relative clauses in natural language data
Type: Practical session (1,5 hours)
Content: Practical application of the insights gained in the plenary session through the retrieval and analysis of attested instances of relative clauses. For this purpose, the students will be invited to (1) search for occurrences of relative sentences in corpus data originating from both written and spoken Contemporary Catalan; (2) classify them according to the prototypical vs. non-prototypical distinction; (3) analyze the subordinating morpheme(s) found in these occurrences and evaluate their pronominal (or non-pronominal) character; (4) identify tendencies for the use of specific relativization-linked constructions with regard to diamesic and genre/register-related factors.
Session 4: Doubts, inquiries, extensions, comments
Type: Tutorial session (1 hour)
Content: Students are invited (1) to ask for clarifications on transmitted contents; (2) to discuss specific questions – particularly those that have arisen while studying language data in the practical session – and aspects of relative-clause formation and, more generally, syntactic subordination that they have found interesting or challenging; (3) to discuss ideas related to the course subject that they find worth or promising for further study in a subsequent phase of their linguistic formation.
Bibliografia bàsica
AA.VV. (2016): “Les oracions subordinades de relatiu”, in: Institut d’Estudis Catalans (ed.): Gramàtica de la llengua catalana, Barcelona: I.E.C., 1029–1070, <https://giec.iec.cat/textgramatica/codi/27.1>.
Fiorentino, Giuliana (2007): “European relative clauses and the uniqueness of the Relative Pronoun Type”, Rivista di Linguistica 19:2, 263–291.
Gadet, Françoise (2003): “La relative française, difficile et complexe”, in: Kriegel, Sibylle (ed.): Grammaticalisation et réanalyse. Approches de la variation créole et française, Paris: CNRS Editions, 251–268.
Lehmann, Christian (1995): “Relativsätze”; in: Jacobs, Joachim et al. (eds.): Syntax, Berlin / New York: De Gruyter (Handbuch der Sprach- und Kommunikationswissenschaft; 9:2), 1199–1216.
Poletto, Cecilia / Sanfelici, Emanuela (2017): “Relative clauses”; in: Dufter, Andreas / Stark, Elisabeth (eds.): Manual of Romance Morphosyntax and Syntax, Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter (MRL; 17), 804–836.
Pusch, Claus D. (2006): “Relative pronoun reduction and resumptive pronouns in spoken Catalan. A corpus-based study”; in: id. (ed.): La gramàtica pronominal del català: variació – evolució – funció / The grammar of Catalan pronouns: variation – evolution – function, Aachen: Shaker (BCG; 5), 85–117.
Solà, Joan (2002): “Les subordinades de relatiu”; in: id. et al. (eds.): Gramàtica del català contemporani. Vol. 3, Barcelona: Empúries, 2455–2565.
Stark, Elisabeth (2016): “Relative clauses”, in: Ledgeway, Adam / Maiden, Martin (eds.): The Oxford Guide to the Romance Languages, Oxford et al.: OUP, 1029–1040.